


Confession

by youcouldmakealife



Series: Impaired Judgment (and other excuses) [121]
Category: Original Work
Genre: M/M, YCMAL 'verse
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-19
Updated: 2020-07-19
Packaged: 2021-03-05 00:49:07
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,324
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25385566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youcouldmakealife/pseuds/youcouldmakealife
Summary: “About yesterday,” Gabe says again. “I need you to know—”“I can—” Jared interrupts, because if he doesn’t get it out soon he knows he’s going to balk. “I’m um. I’m married.”
Relationships: OMC/OMC
Series: Impaired Judgment (and other excuses) [121]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/849798
Comments: 46
Kudos: 392





	Confession

Jared can’t say he’s really looking forward to the conversation with Gabe, but it’s one that needs to happen, and one that needs to happen sooner rather than later judging by the cool head nod he gets from Gabe when he gives him a wave at breakfast. Gabe’s usually a ‘good morning’ at least dude, so Jared’s pretty sure he fucked up. Gabe’s plate is mostly empty, so Jared finds an empty table, mainlines his breakfast way too quickly, and even then he barely finishes in time to intercept Gabe on his way out the door, thankfully alone, because he’s with Dmitry as often as not.

“Can I talk to you?” Jared asks.

“Sure,” Gabe says. “I wanted to talk to you too. About yesterday.”

“Yeah,” Jared says. “That’s what I wanted to talk about. Can we go somewhere, like—”

It’s pretty empty, only a few of their teammates who are taking their time with breakfast left — Jared’s attempts to pump himself up in the mirror took longer than he anticipated — but they’re right beside a table with a couple of the D-men. They’re snickering over something on a phone, so they’re probably not going to hear a thing Jared says, but a little healthy paranoia never hurt anyone, and thankfully Gabe follows Jared to a table tucked in the corner. Jared stacks a few plates some inconsiderate assholes left behind, knows Gabe’s looking at him but can’t quite meet his eye.

“About yesterday,” Gabe says again. “I need you to know—”

“I can—” Jared interrupts, because if he doesn’t get it out soon he knows he’s going to balk. “I’m um. I’m married.”

“Okay,” Gabe says, frowning the exact same way Foster did, like he’s confused by the nonsequitor. Which is understandable. “I kind of figured, what with the ring and all. I just thought you were private about it.”

“I am, kinda,” Jared says. “It’s um. to a guy.”

Gabe doesn’t say anything for a second, and Jared feels the need to be completely clear.

“That’s,” Jared says. “I’ve got a husband.”

“Oh,” Gabe says, then, “Okay, cool.” 

He sounds like it genuinely is, but just as Jared’s starting to feel relieved, Gabe adds, “Me too, basically,” and the relief switches to a sense of betrayal, both by Gabe, cracking jokes about it, and by his own instincts, which told him this was a safe guy to tell.

“Kay,” Jared mumbles. “I’m gonna—”

“ _Dude_ ,” Gabe says. “I’m not kidding. You met Stephen. Like, for a minute, but you met him.”

“Your roommate?” Jared asks.

“He’s my boyfriend,” Gabe says, and the living arrangements suddenly make way more sense. 

Also Jared’s apparently an _idiot_.

“I thought you said you were married, though,” Jared says.

“We haven’t had a wedding or anything, but we’ve been cohabiting for seven years, so the BC government says we don’t have to bother to put a ring on it to be considered spouses,” Gabe says. “Though our parents are kind of pissed that we’re not doing it anyway.”

“Who knows?” Jared asks. Gabe’s not talking loudly or anything, but he’s not being quiet either, like Jared was, not saying it like it’s a secret. 

“About me and Stephen?” Gabe asks.

“Yeah,” Jared says.

“On the team?” Gabe says. 

“Yeah,” Jared repeats.

“Like, who I’ve personally told or who is ninety-nine percent sure but is too awkward to ask?” Gabe asks.

“Uh,” Jared says. “Either? Both?”

“Dmitry, all of the vets know for sure,” Gabe says. “Pretty much everyone who’s been here since before this season. I think the entire roster has figured out he’s my boyfriend. We’re not shouting it from the rooftops or anything, because the media—” he makes a face Jared wholly agrees with, “— but we’re not hiding it from the team.”

“And they don’t mind?” Jared asks incredulously. 

It’s not that he thinks that no hockey players are safe to tell — Raf and Chaz and Julius clearly attest to the fact that some guys are totally cool with it, and Jared got the same impression from Gabe, apparently for good reason — but an entire roster? There’s no way.

“Nah,” Gabe says. “And if they did their wives and girlfriends would have something to say about it, Stephen’s one-hundred percent been adopted by them. He hosts wine parties for them at our place when I’m on the road, it’s bullshit.”

He sounds pretty happy about it for someone calling it bullshit, but Jared gets that. He’d be happy about it too, if it was possible for Bryce to be doing the same thing. Which — it isn’t, obviously.

“I don’t think they’d be adopting my husband any time soon,” Jared says before he can stop himself.

“Stephen’s like the grumpiest person alive sometimes, if they adopted him I’m sure your husband will be part of the crew in a day,” Gabe says.

“I—” Jared says. “Kind of doubt it?”

“He can’t be that bad,” Gabe says.

“No, he’s great,” Jared says. “It’s just — anyway, it doesn’t matter, he’s back in Alberta.”

“Cool, maybe I can meet him next time we’re out there?” Gabe asks.

“Maybe,” Jared says, because ‘there’s not a chance in hell he’d be okay with that’ probably isn’t polite. “Could I — could I tell my husband I have a gay teammate? Like, I don’t have to tell him who it is or anything, I think he’d just — I think he’d feel better knowing that?”

“I’m bi,” Gabe says. “But yeah. You can say it’s me too, I don’t mind — he’s not going to go running to reporters about it, I’m sure.”

“No,” Jared says. “Definitely not.”

“Then I don’t mind,” Gabe says.

“Okay,” Jared says. He’s grinning so hard he probably looks ridiculous — this is not how he expected this conversation to go, this wasn’t even what he considered a best case scenario — but Gabe doesn’t call him out on it. “Okay.”

“Is it cool if I tell Stephen?” Gabe asks. “About like—”

It’d be pretty hypocritical if Jared said no, considering. 

“Yeah, as long as he’s like—” Jared says.

“He won’t say shit,” Gabe says.

“Then, yeah, cool,” Jared says.

“He’s going to want you to come over for dinner when we get back home,” Gabe says. “Just warning you in advance. He already likes you.”

Jared’s confusion, considering they met for like two seconds, must be evident.

“I told him you guys have the same sense of humour and view of the world and stuff,” Gabe says. 

Jared is no less confused, and now he’s kind of curious what Gabe thinks Jared’s sense of humour and view of the world is.

“Like —” Jared says finally. “Snide? And — cynical? Or—”

“Yeah, he’s going to love you,” Gabe says with a laugh.

Okay, apparently Gabe’s boyfriend is a fellow hobgoblin. That’s good to know. Jared kind of misses fellow hobgoblins — everyone in Vancouver’s been crazy nice to him. Not that he’s complaining about it, but — it’s weird. He reminds himself to give his mom a call, check in on whether Julius is withering away without Jared feeding him. He claims he’s been cooking for himself, but Jared isn’t buying it.

“I’ve gotta—” Jared says. 

“Tell your husband?” Gabe asks.

“Yeah,” Jared says. 

“Go on, I’ll see you at practice,” Gabe says, and Jared takes it double time to the lobby. It’s kind of weird that he feels impatient, annoyed that he has like, good news and that Bryce doesn’t know about it yet. Is that normal? Not being able to be happy about good things unless Bryce gets to know about the good things too?

Schmid’s in the shower when Jared gets back, and who knows when he got in it, how long that’ll last, but he’s a bathroom hog, takes forever with his whole grooming thing — Jared has no clue what takes so long, dude always looks unkempt, but maybe that’s a purposeful look? — so Jared’s probably safe. He checks the time. Bryce has practice in an hour, so that works.

“Did you do it?” Bryce asks immediately. “How’d it go?”

“Uh,” Jared says. “He was really cool about it. Like, shockingly cool about it.”

“Good,” Bryce says. “I’m glad.”

“Probably because he has a boyfriend,” Jared says. “Of like seven years.”

“What?” Bryce says, then, “You sure he wasn’t fucking with you?”

“Yeah,” Jared says. “I’ve actually met him. I thought they were just roommates, but boyfriend makes way more sense.”

A slightly embarrassing giggle leaves his mouth. It’s apparently contagious.

“You’ve got a gay teammate,” Bryce says a little hysterically.

“He’s bi,” Jared says. “And. Linemate, actually. He said he didn’t mind if I told you — well, if I told my husband, I didn’t tell him who you were, obviously.”

“Markson?” Bryce asks. Which sounds like a great guess, but considering Jared went on a rant after Dmitry sprayed shaving cream down the back of his jersey in the locker room after he scored his first goal for the Canucks that he couldn’t believe Dmitry not only somehow convinced someone to marry him but had fathered literal children, it was probably an easy one.

“Yeah,” Jared says. “And apparently the Canucks all know he has a boyfriend and they’re cool with it.”

“Or they’re just pretending to be,” Bryce says.

Or they’re just pretending to be, yeah, but Jared’s got to say that pretending to be cool with it is way better than loudly not being cool with it, and frankly more than he’d expect from any roster, especially after dealing with Deslauriers, knowing what the Flames are like. 

“I’m really glad you’ve got like, company,” Bryce says after a moment, sounding like he means it. 

Which like, of course he does, but if it was Jared in Bryce’s place he probably wouldn’t be able to help feeling jealous on a number of levels. Bryce’s linemate rep for YCP uses homophobic slurs, Jared’s linemate YCP rep invited Jared over for dinner to meet his boyfriend properly. 

Bryce is on a team with a bunch of assholes — and Chaz — with management who already didn’t like him before they found out about Jared, Jared’s on a team that knows one of their As is gay — bi, shit — and apparently doesn’t care, or at least pretends not to, and he’s got a GM that was vocally supportive if a little flaily when Jared told him. Also, re-examining that conversation with the benefit of hindsight makes it really obvious that Foster was probably trying to push Jared to talk to Gabe for a different reason than he thought — or at least more than one reason — but he never actually revealed anything about Gabe’s sexuality when he did it, which makes Jared like Foster even more.

And that’s on top of Jared getting to play for Bryce’s childhood team, to live in his childhood home with Bryce’s mom. Jared’s pretty much living the life Bryce would have wanted growing up. Except not even, because Jared’s probably living the life Bryce would never have dreamt he could have possibly _have_ when he was growing up. And there wasn’t a hint of resentment in Bryce’s voice when he told Jared he was happy for him.

“I love you, you know that?” Jared asks.

“I know,” Bryce says, which Jared needs to hear more than ‘I love you too’ right now, though Bryce says it immediately after, because he’s Bryce. “Maybe I can meet Markson when you come to town next month?”

“Seriously?” Jared asks.

“Not like, the whole team,” Bryce says. “I’m not —”

“I know,” Jared says. “But you’d be okay with that?”

“Chaz could come, it could be like,” Bryce says. “Chill. Like, we could grab drinks or dinner or something somewhere. Maybe not like — I don’t know if I’d be ready for him to like, know who we are to each other, not when I don’t actually know him, but like — meeting him’s the first step, you know?”

“Yeah,” Jared says. “Did I mention I love you?”

“You did,” Bryce says. “But I’m never gonna get sick of you saying it, so like, you can keep saying it if you want.”

“Okay,” Jared says. “I will.”

“What’s Markson’s boyfriend like?” Bryce asks.

“Apparently snide and cynical,” Jared says.

“Oof,” Bryce says, and Jared can hear the wince.

“Hey,” Jared says.

“What?” Bryce says.

“ _Rude_ ,” Jared says.

“What?” Bryce says, sounding confused.

“Gabe told me that’s why we’d get along,” Jared says. 

“Why?” Bryce says, sounding even more confused.

“Because _I’m_ snide and cynical,” Jared says. It maybe comes out a little snidely, because seriously, how is Bryce still confused.

“No you aren’t,” Bryce says.

“Bryce,” Jared says. 

“But like in a good way!” Bryce protests. “I like it from you!”

“Uh huh,” Jared says.

“I do!” Bryce says, then, sounding defeated, “I’m in trouble aren’t I.”

Jared’s too amused by his frantic backpedaling to be mad at him, honestly. And it’s not like he doesn’t know that about himself, and not like Bryce doesn’t know it about him either. Hell, he incorporated Jared’s snideness into his _vows_. Though it’s faintly worrying that Gabe picked up on those things within weeks of meeting him, especially because Jared has been on his best behaviour the whole time. Apparently Jared’s best behaviour’s still noticeably snide.

“You’re lucky,” Jared says anyway, because the shower’s stopped. “Schmid’s coming out of the bathroom so you’re safe.”

Bryce snorts. “Thanks Schmid.” 

“Say hi to Julius for me,” Jared says. Not that he hasn’t talked to Julius like, literally yesterday, but the Oilers are in Calgary right now, playing the Flames tomorrow. It’s hard not to be a little upset about it, knowing that if he was still an Oiler he’d be eating his dad’s cooking, sleeping beside Bryce in his own bed, but considering when he gets back to Vancouver he’ll be greeted by an exuberant Elaine, with plans to have dinner with a teammate and his _boyfriend_ , well —

He can’t really complain.


End file.
